title: More reasons to be straightforward: findings and norms for two scales relevant to social anxiety.
abstract: The validity of both the Social Interaction Anxiety Scale and Brief Fear of Negative Evaluation scale has been well-supported, yet the scales have a small number of reverse-scored items that may detract from the validity of their total scores. The current study investigates two characteristics of participants that may be associated with compromised validity of these items: higher age and lower levels of education. In community and clinical samples, the validity of each scale's reverse-scored items was moderated by age, years of education, or both. The straightforward items did not show this pattern. To encourage the use of the straightforward items of these scales, we provide normative data from the same samples as well as two large student samples. We contend that although response bias can be a substantial problem, the reverse-scored questions of these scales do not solve that problem and instead decrease overall validity.
authors.affiliation: Washington University in St. Louis, 1 Brookings Drive, Campus Box 1125, St. Louis, MO 63130, USA. rodebaugh@wustl.edu
authors.forename: Thomas L
authors.initials: TL
authors.lastname: Rodebaugh
authors.forename: Richard G
authors.initials: RG
authors.lastname: Heimberg
authors.forename: Patrick J
authors.initials: PJ
authors.lastname: Brown
authors.forename: Katya C
authors.initials: KC
authors.lastname: Fernandez
authors.forename: Carlos
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Blanco
authors.forename: Franklin R
authors.initials: FR
authors.lastname: Schneier
authors.forename: Michael R
authors.initials: MR
authors.lastname: Liebowitz
mesh_terms: D000293:Adolescent; D000328:Adult; D000367:Age Factors; D000368:Aged; D000369:Aged, 80 and over; D001007:Anxiety / Q000523:psychology*; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D010698:Phobic Disorders / Q000523:psychology*; D011569:Psychiatric Status Rating Scales; D011594:Psychometrics; D012016:Reference Values; D015203:Reproducibility of Results; D011795:Surveys and Questionnaires